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1. Rise
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“Kyaaa! Madam!”
The scream pierced through Aer’s ears. As she drifted away from the ground, the cloudy sky filled her vision.
Splash—
A chilling sensation enveloped her entire body, causing her mind to momentarily reel as her heart began to pound fiercely. She struggled with her legs, but only ended up entangling herself further in her dress, squeezing her body tighter.
Under the force pressing down from above, her body plummeted rapidly downwards.
Even underwater, with eyes wide open, Aer stared at her mother. Was this the expression of a person possessed by a demon?
No, it was her own birth mother who had pushed her daughter into the water…
She tried with all her might to pull away from her mother, desperate to stay alive, but her dry fingers relentlessly clung to her.
‘Mother, why do you…….’
Despite loving her mother so dearly, why did she have to face such a situation?
Hot tears welled up even in the cold water. Rather than resentment, her heart was overwhelmed with sorrow.
Why did her own life have to be so unfortunate?
Feeling forsaken by her close family and facing a reality where even her life was threatened, Aer’s struggling legs came to a halt as the despair overwhelmed her.
What followed next could easily be foreseen without imagining it. Her heart raced madly, and her chest tightened.
The moment her toes touched the pond’s bottom, Aer completely gave up on living.
At that moment, the pond rippled. The water rapidly flowed in one direction, lifting her and her mother up with it.
Splash-
“Heuk!”
Aer deeply breathed in the fresh air.
“Cough.”
By her side, her mother forcefully expelled the water she had swallowed.
“What on earth is this all about!”
As the two bewildered individuals failed to regain their composure, a scolding remark resounded. Aer blinked rapidly and looked up at her father, who stood there stiffly.
Despite no longer being a child, her father still seemed toweringly intimidating, and Aer felt a sudden pang of fear.
“How dare you stir up trouble in my household?”
Drenched from the water, with a flushed face, her mother, as vivid as her eyes, stared fiercely at her father and spoke in a venomous tone.
“Let’s divorce. I’m sick of it, I can’t live with you anymore.”
“…Hah.”
Father chuckled at Mother’s words. They stared at each other as if ready to devour one another.
Watching such parents, Aer bit her lips, clutching strands of grass until blood seeped through her fingers.
She felt as though she might scream if she didn’t do something. Her fingertips trembled; her body suddenly engulfed in a fiery heat.
From her childhood, her parents had never shown any interest in their daughter who had miraculously survived.
As Aer felt a sense of collapsing dizziness from head to toe, she reached out for support, but no one was there for her.
Thud—
Collapsed on the ground, ignored even by the household staff, she blinked her eyes, gradually losing consciousness.
Just before completely losing consciousness, an irritated voice pierced her ears.
“I’m sick of it too. Fine, let’s get a divorce.”
The relationship between her parents, which had felt like walking on thin ice for sixteen years, finally shattered.
As she felt herself slipping away between the cracks, she completely lost consciousness.
✦ . ⁺ . ✦ . ⁺ . ✦
Aer was having a long dream. Like a lucid dream, she realized that she was walking through a dream.
Silently gazing at strange objects, she had never seen before and people in unfamiliar clothing, she slowly lifted her eyelids as the world faded away.
The dark bedroom that came into view was familiar.
Drenched in sweat, and feeling clammy all over, Aer struggled to sit up.
Turning on the lamp beside her bed, she felt a parching thirst and reached for the small pitcher on the bedside table.
Without even thinking about pouring it into a cup, she brought the pitcher to her lips and gulped it down.
If anyone had seen her, they might have been surprised. It was so unlike her, who was usually so concerned with her dignity.
“Ha, so that’s why…… my life has been so unhappy.”
As soon as she woke up, Aer’s first words were rather incongruous.
Having fallen into a freezing cold pond in the middle of winter and miraculously survived, Aer’s frail body couldn’t withstand the tremendous fever that followed.
During that time, she recalled her past life. And she found out why she had grown up so unhappy.
From her earliest memories, her parents were always fighting. As a result, Aer always had to tread carefully, feeling like she was walking on eggshells.
“Under the moonlit moonflower…”
That was the title of a web novel she had read in her past life.
It followed a typical cliché plot of “losing a shitty car and gaining a Benz,” but with three-dimensional characters and the author’s exceptional writing skills, it was a very popular work.
T/n: In Korean culture, the phrase “Mercedes Benz and shit cars” is often used metaphorically to describe a stark contrast between wealth and poverty or high status and low status. When someone is described as a “shit car” in Korean slang, it means they are considered low-class, undesirable, or even contemptible. It implies that the person lacks refinement, sophistication, or social status. It’s a derogatory term used to criticize someone’s character, behavior, or social standing, suggesting that they are inferior or unworthy. And in this case, it’s because her father is trash.
“I can’t believe my dad was that shit car…….”
That’s right.
Aer’s father in the story is the stupid supporting male character who rejected the heroine’s love.
Instead of just rejecting her, he humiliated and scorned her.
Due to the theme, later when the heroine got along with the original male lead, racked with belated regret, he desperately clung to the heroine.
And this situation continued to the present day.
Unable to withstand the pressure from his parents, he even got married to another woman but still couldn’t forget the heroine, neglecting his family.
Thus, the mother gradually became tired and started having hysterical outbursts towards the children. As it worsened over time, she eventually tried to commit suicide with Aer.
Her hand, holding onto the bedding, trembled.
Even when she calmly recalled the past in her mind as a third party, the body’s reaction engraved with memories that crossed the threshold of death was different.
Feeling absurd and unjust, her fingertips gradually grew colder.
Aer rose from the bed, overcome with frustration and suffocation. She crossed the bedroom to approach the window.
Sitting down on the sill, she gazed outside, lost in thought.
She was lost in thought, trying to recall what she had seen in her dream when suddenly she wondered about the present moment.
“…In the original story, the female lead and male lead definitely got married and lived happily ever after, right?”
As Aer pondered deeply, her own reflection faintly illuminated by the window came into view.
A white face, pale with pain, a tightly furrowed brow, and dark, vivid blue hair, defining her as the daughter of that shit car.
Lastly, her eyes, akin to spring, although in the prequel only mentioned briefly in a one-line description, unquestionably matched the daughter of that shit car.
Leaning against the window frame, she took a moment to examine her appearance and murmured at a sudden thought.
“Perhaps this… ”
As a popular work, readers had high expectations for a sequel. responded to readers’ demands by publishing a second volume.
The lengthy spin-off could be summarized in just two parts.
The love of the protagonist couple’s adorable youngest daughter.
And…….
“The unresolved revenge from the main story. That is, the downfall of the Shit Car family…”
She slowly covered her mouth with both hands as the spin-off’s plot began to emerge in her mind.
She was a character who had only appeared in a few lines. Later in the original story, she became a character even the female lead sympathized with, but among the supporting characters, she was very poorly developed.
Her sad and agonized feelings gradually turned into anger. Heat rose to her pale cheeks, making them flush.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake…”
She had already died before the family’s downfall in the novel. And it was from a treatable illness to boot.
Awakened and healer.
They had to find each other. If they failed to do so, they could lose their lives.
This was one of the key points in the novel.
Most awakened individuals or healers manifest early, but the character Ael, who manifested late, failed to meet her pair and eventually exploded due to uncontrolled energy, leading to her death.
The mansion’s servants, let alone the family, didn’t even know about it, so she met a lonely death. In the original spin-off…
Hence, the only character that the original female lead sympathized with in this household was herself.
“…….”
With both hands clasped together, Ael focused her gaze. She couldn’t die like this.
Even if she couldn’t find her pair, there was still a way to live.
As long as she prepared well in advance, there was nothing to worry about.
As dawn approached.
At that moment, there was suddenly a commotion outside. Wondering what could be happening at this hour, she glanced down.
At the mansion’s entrance, there was a baggage cart and a regular carriage parked.
And servants were coming out, one after another, carrying luggage. She couldn’t take her eyes off them, as they looked like they were moving.
Then, the words she heard before fainting came back to her.
[I’m sick of it too. Fine, let’s get a divorce.]
The father’s cold voice.
Her mother stubbornly stared at the father with a venomous glare.
Aer, lost in thought for a moment, suddenly jumped up. She stumbled but still went into the dressing room and put on a thick coat.
Deciding to cherish her body from now on, Aer carefully adjusted her collar.
Surely her mother was in the midst of packing.
She no longer had any intention of seeking affection from her mother. That would have been the case even if she hadn’t remembered her past life.
Having left her affection for her mother at the bottom of the cold pond.
Still, there was one thing she wanted to ask.
As she hurried down the stairs, the servants she encountered looked at her with surprise and confusion.
But that was about the extent of their reaction. A child neglected by her parents naturally did not receive proper treatment from the servants.
Growing up, she didn’t know what was wrong, but when she remembered her former life, she realized that their attitude was disrespectful.
But now, she had to see her mother.
Aer, who spotted her mother about to board the last carriage, shouted, “Wait a moment!”
Erica, who didn’t realize that she had woken up, turned back with a slightly surprised expression, then responded with an expressionless face.
“Why are you calling me?”
At the numbness in her voice, Aer deliberately widened her shoulders, which instinctively contracted.
Then, looking straight into her mother’s eyes, she asked.
